


Wenn du mir was bedeuten würdest - (tust du nicht!)

by Vanillinzucker



Category: Pacific Rim (2013)
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2013-12-23
Updated: 2013-12-28
Packaged: 2018-01-05 18:16:19
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 6
Words: 12,085
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1097099
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Vanillinzucker/pseuds/Vanillinzucker
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The German version of "Highschool AU". In 2007, Newt has to move to Saxony for his last year of High School and meets Hermann, who is not exactly the most favored student in class.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Es ist nicht deine Schuld

**Author's Note:**

> So, I guess this is my first fanfic (at least the first one I wrote down properly). This is for the [ German Pacific Rim fandom ](http://www.tumblr.com/tagged/pazifischer_rand) (which is awesome)

In 2025, I watched the War Clock stopping. Happy, satisfied and mostly, relieved.

Almost 18 years earlier, in the late summer of 2007, my eyes were fixed on another clock. Tick, tock. It seemed to mock me, showing me how many minutes were left until the torture started again. I sighed, resting my head against my wall while blatantly ignoring my father’s shouts.

“Newton! Get up; you’re going to be late!” He always used to exclamation point every single thing he said – for some reason, although I should be used to it, it bugged me, like it was itching inside my ears. Which was the reason for me ignoring him now.

Seemingly, he resigned, too, because now he ripped open my door. “You’re still not dressed!” he called, sounding astonished. “Maybe because I don’t want to go?” I said eye-rolling, flopping back on the bed. He raised one eyebrow, looking at the clock I stared at five minutes ago critical. “Your bus is going to be here in 20 minutes.”

The bus? For about a second I wondered what the hell he was talking about, but then I remembered: There was no chance I could walk from the flat to my school today, which was just around the corner. There wasn’t even a chance I was going to be mocked by the same ignorant asses who had known me for the greater parts of my life. That caught me off guard – Was I going to start missing my shit school in Berlin now?

Perhaps it wasn’t so much as missing that, but I certainly missed the city. This was deep, rural Germany and I was lucky I had a wireless connection (or so my neighbor told me yesterday when I complained about the internet loading about as fast as it did towards the end of the nineties). Of course it had to be the last year I actually lived at home and had to go to school my dad decided that it was best to move. Sure, it was great for my dad that he got that job at the opera in Leipzig, no doubt, but I couldn’t think of a real reason for not actually moving to the city, but to a small village an hour away from it. 

While I pulled myself out of bed and carelessly put on a T-Shirt and jeans, I smashed my bag around. I searched for my phone, some old Blackberry resembling a brick, and put various folders, a writing pad and pens, all yet unmarked – but there would certainly be scribbled on everything soon enough, blind scribbles, constructed cubes and band lyrics – into my worn, black school backpack. 

“You’ve got ten minutes!” my dad announced as I tumbled down the stairs, putting on a pair of Converse sneakers so worn out I should’ve replaced them by now and sticking my toothbrush in my mouth. “You should eat something!” my dad says instead of commenting on my deranged look when I peak around the corner to see him sitting, reading a newspaper. Well, at least that didn’t change. Even if it was the “Leipziger Volkszeitung” now where there was the “Berliner Zeitung” before. The construction of the house felt strange, new, since I’ve been only here for a week now. It felt a bit like a vacation home, the one we had one summer on a lake not at all far away from Berlin, mainly because it had two stories and the flat in Berlin hadn’t.  

The bus outside the door honked and I ran out, half losing my stuff because the bag was open and holding the toast I was forced to eat between my teeth. It came to my mind that going to school in a private bus was one of the most posh things I ever did – but the posh ended the moment I was dropped off at a railway station. The other three students – one a tiny kid with round glasses and a Nintendo DS lite he played Pokémon on, one round and even shorter than me, wearing a pair of expensive, neon-colored  sneakers and a third one, a quiet, spindly type who kept brushing his pony behind his ears – climbed out completely unfazed, so I gathered it was normal. And here I was, thinking I could get some sleep in the bus while “Die Ärzte” blared into my ears.

“What’s going to happen now?” I asked the three of them. Surprisingly enough, it was the round guy (who was wearing gigantic headphones, by the way) who pulled out a cigarette as soon as we got out, who answered. “We’re waiting for the next bus.” You could hear his _Duh_ the next town over, which was, coincidentally, really far away. The train station itself only consisted of a smashed bus stop that had glass splinters all around it and glass boards holding inaccurate schedules.  

“And when’s that supposed to happen?” I queried, staring at the mostly empty street. “Could take half an hour.”

He was right; the bus came half an hour later. The round one had smoked through two cigarettes by then and the little kid stopped playing Pokémon and started to talk with himself. Aloud.

The bus was – at least that was familiar – smelly and full of unmotivated teenagers. Half of them were snoring; the other half listened to music loud enough to make everybody else hearing it too.

It was just like using the Berlin metro – except that the smell of urine was only faintly in the air here.

By the time we reached the school I had almost nodded off. And I would’ve fallen asleep completely if it wasn’t for the four girls sitting in front of me chatting (really loudly) about the parties they went to in the holidays. And even the guy screaming “ _Es ist nicht deine Schuld_ ” in my ears couldn’t fade them out. In fact, I now kinda felt like it was my fault. I should’ve fought harder to stay at my uncle’s in Berlin rather than moving with my dad. But since I was still 17, I couldn’t decide for myself. That would still take half a year and after six months I would be so caught up in stress about my Abitur exams (my father keeps insisting on that) that another move would be out of question.

I sighed, following the other students who moved towards the school building (which was old and brick-red) a bit like sheep, with demotivated dropped heads. Trying to integrate myself into the mass I stared at a board telling me in which room which class would meet. My attempt failed, though, because the only other people who looked at the board were children half my height (Fifth-graders, I snorted inside my head. They were shorter every year.) and their parents.

Because the parents looked caught up, I decided to rather ask some student where I should go. I’ve never been to the school before, even though the headmaster tried to get me and my dad interested in a tour. My dad made the tour without me, filled out all the forms without me and transferred my files without me. He was good at sorting things out, so good that he didn’t need me making a face while admiring the two school buildings (one was the red one, the other one was white). He showed me the Wikipedia site, which undoubtedly was edited by the very eager headmaster.

“Do you know where the reception is?” I asked one of the students. He ignored me, rushing past me to snog his girlfriend. Thanks, mate, I thought, watching them making out for five minutes. When they finally started breathing separately again, I repeated my question. “Second floor, last room on the right.” he said before storming off. His girlfriend looked after him longingly and I decided I’d better go.

In the office they just said I should head to room 22. “It’s on the first floor in the other building, Newton.” Her face looked funny when she tried to pronounce my name. It rolled off her tongue with difficulty and she scrunched up her nose (her glasses were pulled up a bit) as if she had a problem with German parents giving their child an English name. To be honest, I met a lot of people like this. Maybe they should’ve just called me Niklas or Leon.   That would’ve been a lot more native.

While I walked to the other school building, I watched the people around me. Since I knew nobody here, that was the only thing I could do amidst all of them reuniting and scooting to their first lessons. The first lesson always consists of the whole class meeting with their class teacher. They handed out schedules and informed the students about upcoming events and dates for class trips and so on. There was always a fight about who was louder – the excited students who just finished their holidays and had the pent-up need to share all their stories or the teachers who tried to organize the chaos. It had been like that in my old school and, sure enough, it was that way when I opened the door to room 22.

Room 22 was full of loud students and, on top of them, two teachers (one was an old woman with red hair and a croaky voice and the other one a guy with hair that started to turn grey and crooked glasses) who introduced themselves as Ms. Stiewe and Mr. Heuschkel. I found out later that she taught Geography and Russian and he was a History and P.E. teacher.

The bell rang an unfamiliar old-school-sound. In my old school, it was just an electronic beep, but here it was the real deal. “Welcome back!” Ms. Stiewe croaked. The students toned their voices down enough for me to understand her and I hurried to find a place. I let myself fall into a seat in the last row, which was far enough from the teacher’s table to be ignored. There was no one sitting next to me, because for an entire grade the class was astonishingly small. I counted 25 people sitting on the stairs in front of me. The room had to be one where science was taught – there were posters about nuclear energy and a particle accelerator (both only modestly creative) and tables with sockets.

“This is your last school year and from the results of the last year I shall say you’re all going to make it through your exams if you keep working like that.” She kept going on like this. “Also, we have a new face in our classroom today.” They turned around, but looked at a shy, dark haired girl who mumbled something in Spanish. “Not Sandra.” The man said, a bit pissed. He seemed to be a generally pissed teacher who liked to make fun of his students and who was not that much into teaching at all. “Our new student transferred here from Berlin.” Ms. Stiewe tried to make up for the discouraging look on the other teacher’s face and said “You might want to introduce yourself.” No, actually I didn’t. But in her voice was also a bit of an urging, which reminded me of my grandma asking me to wash the dishes. You could refuse, but it wasn’t very nice to do so.

I cleared my throat. “Hi, I’m Newton Geiszler.” That should do. I mean, what was I supposed to say? Tell them my life story? No, thank you very much. Now they did turn around to me, eyeing me with lazy curiosity. I imagined what they saw: A small guy who finally stopped being scrawny, but is not quite finished with that yet with unkempt brown hair which somehow ended up either sticking up or hanging flatly down the forehead and too big glasses that tended to slide down the nose. I looked nothing out of the ordinary, even a bit too ordinary for my taste. I wished I looked more punk, to give someone something to look at, but I simply didn’t. Obviously, the others decided I looked boring the same moment I did, because they turned around.

Well, I thought, I am neither threat nor improvement to them. I could live with that. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> For those who don't know the German school system: It varies between 9 to 12 years, but you have to graduate after 12 years (called 'Abitur') to be able to go to a college.  
> The school system is different for each of the 16 states.  
> The elementary school is year 1-4 (age: 6-10)  
> The secondary school (gymnasium) is year 5-12 (age: 11-18) 
> 
> "Es ist nicht deine Schuld" (engl. It's not your fault) is this song: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ojrkyXbkdEE
> 
> I thought writing in English made more sense, but in theory every word is in German. (I'm German, too, so...)


	2. Ich würde alles für dich tun (naja alles vielleicht nicht)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Newt meets Hermann... sort of.

After the first lesson and a very boring but enthusiastic speech the headmaster gave I kept sitting in room 22. I looked at my schedule and tried to figure out what subjects I told my father I was going to do. There was only a limited amount of ability courses I could’ve chosen. I just wasn’t able to remember which one.

Scanning the room for someone who could possibly tell me, my eyes landed on two characters that appeared unassuming to me. I went over to them (I never was someone you could call shy) and placed myself on the table. “Hello” I said, looking at them directly. The girl, who was also wearing glasses and had blonde hair that looked a bit electrified, shot a glance at the guy standing next to her, who was black haired and about my height. He was cute, well, sort of. Cute in an “I’m a perfect son-in-law”-way. I knew that, because I had one like him before.

“Hi. You’re the new guy, Newton.” He said that matter-of-factly, but he had the “trying not to tumble over the name” matter of speech, too.  “Is that a nickname?” the girl asked. “I’m Anne, by the way.” “No, that’s my name. My nickname’s Newt.” “Newt?” she smiled. “I like that. I never met one before whose parents were brave enough to give him an English name.” “She’s pretty anglophile” the guy added “and my best friend. I’m Florian.”

“Who should I ask if I’m not sure which courses I’m in?” “Well, if you’re concerned you’ll land in the wrong course, there’s only one ability course per subject.”

“It’s not that. I literally don’t know which subject I’m in at all.” Florian creased his forehead.  Anne laughed a bit and I smiled as if it was a joke. I shouldn’t tell them I let my dad fill out the forms. They seemed dedicated enough to find that weird. “You should go to Mr. Guth. He’s the advanced level counselor. He’ll have a list.” “And where…?”

“Come along.” She hopped off the table and gestured me to follow her. Florian also followed her without complaining. The room was just two doors further.  
“He’s not here.” a teacher said when they were asking.

“Again!” she exclaimed. Then she walked out. It was starting to get hot, a late summer present for the students so they would regret the end of the holidays even more. In Berlin, the holidays weren’t even over. I felt cheated, since I should’ve stayed at home a week longer.

“There he is.” Florian said, pointing at a middle-aged man who stood in the sun smoking. His smoking spot was on top of stairs leading down into a small town. At the bottom of the stairs there was a sidewalk leading along a dirty, brown river, presumably the Mulde.

“Herr Guth?” Anne asked. “Hello, Anne.” I was impressed he knew their names, but I supposed it was because there were only 200 students in total. Florian gave me a nudge in the side. “Hello, I’m Newt. I sorta forgot which subjects I’m in?” The teacher coughed, a throaty, hurtful sound caused by his Chesterfield, and then said he’d print me a list.

“Shouldn’t you be in your first ability course right now?” They looked at each other, cursed and ran off. Great. In Berlin I was in a biology ability course, but it seemed as if there wasn’t such a thing in Saxony. So now I was in chemistry, which was okay at first, but a bit weird once I entered the laboratory. “Where are the students?” I asked incredulous. There was a teacher in a lab coat, granted, but the room was mostly empty. “They should come in about a second.” he announced. “So, you are the new one, Newton, right?”

“Yeah.”

“Have a seat.” I turned towards the rear. “Please sit up front. I don’t want to shout.”

I dropped my bag on a seat in the first row. Two girls entered the room, one with short black hair and one with long blonde hair and a disdainful look. Oh well. They closed the door behind them. “You only have two students?” I asked baffled. “Three now.” the teacher corrected me calmly. I wasn’t even that into chemistry. The Ministry of Culture banned all kinds of dangerous (or even vaguely interesting) experiments from being performed in school, so the only thing we got to do these days was throwing formulas around and doing “mind experiments”. And that was only the nice way of saying “Read that textbook side and do the tasks I write on the blackboard.”

As I was already expecting that, you couldn’t say I was disappointed. The subject met my expectation. Although the Abitur in general was supposed to be harder in Saxony than it was in Berlin, I wasn’t expecting any trouble and while the two girls – the blonde one was called Verena and the other one Pascale, who introduced herself with a warning glare that said “Don’t you dare ask me why I have a name that’s male in Germany!” – seemed to struggle more than necessary, I only paid attention to every second word the teacher said. What sort of a weird school was this that they had courses with only two students? After the lesson, I asked Verena, who just stared at me emotionlessly until Pascale answered. “Ah, it’s normal here. See, we don’t have that many students. Also, the French ability course has only one student from our grade.” “Aha. I still think it’s weird.” “You’ll get used to it.” She flung her black hair back – which was a wonder, since it was barely shoulder length. “We have this new thing called ‘study time’ now.” she announced. “You should come with us.”

I hurried along them down the stairs. “What’s a ‘study time’?” I asked. “It’s a weird thing the teachers thought might help us doing our homework.” I coughed ironically. “We don’t have homework. It’s the first day of school.” “Oh, I know.” she said grinning.

We sat down in a room and just hung out, I guessed. Until the teacher came (it was Mr. Guth and he smelled of cigarettes again), with another student behind him who seemed really agitated. “But you can’t do that!” he yelled. The teacher spun around, looking him in the eye. “See, what can I do? The curriculum says so. Just accept it already.” The student, who was really scrawny and a bit red-faced, rolled his eyes massively. “I don’t think so.” “Well, as long as you won’t bother me with it anymore, Hermann.”

The skinny guy, Hermann, sighed exasperated before jamming his bag down forcefully. I stared at the back of his head and wondered what on earth that had been about. Delighted about him rolling his eyes at the teacher I asked Pascale, who was daggering the back of Hermann’s brown-haired head with her eyes, what Hermann’s problem was.  
“Hell, if I know! I’m just glad he’s not in Chemistry.” “Why?” “ _Weil er ein Arschloch ist_.” Verena remarked. I almost jumped out of my seat in surprise that she was talking. “Why do you think so?” I asked. He didn’t seem like an asshole, more like a serious student. He was very scrawny, a fact his crumpled clothes couldn’t hide and he looked very determined. His brown hair, although it looked soft, seemed often ruffled and his eyes, I was sure of that, were still furiously fixated on the teacher, who put a laptop on his table and simply ignored the students surrounding him.

Verena didn’t answer, she just kept looking creepy. “He always acts as if he’s so much smarter than we are.” Pascale explained. “But that’s not even true. Florian’s way better than him.” “Perfect son-in-law Florian?” She giggled. “You could say that, yes. He’s always on 1.0 because he’s good in sports as well as in science, arts, languages… you pick. Hermann’s a good third place, but nothing more. He’s not interested in German and he’s considerably horrible in Sports.”

They seemed to have a rather unhealthy competition. I didn’t even ask who the second was; because I didn’t want to have their abilities looked into, too. Also, I didn't support her opinion. Their rank should have nothing to do with how smart they are, it's rather measuring how good they are in memorizing stuff. Ah, and yapping. 

“So Newt… how was life in Berlin?” Fine, I thought. Better than here. But I wouldn’t tell them that, because that would imply me being rude. And I maybe was frank and ironic, but rude? I wouldn’t go so far. “Alright, I guess.” “Why’d you move?” “My dad had a job offer he couldn’t refuse.” I said in a deep lilt and she, as I hoped she would, laughed. “Do you have a girlfriend?” I, totally in answering questions mode, was, as always, an open book: “No, definitely not. I’m gay.”

The people around us, who had been chatting, laughing and generally, doing loud things, stopped. Then they all started staring at me, dumbfounded. “What, you’ve never seen an openly gay guy? Am I an object for examination yet?” I laughed after an astonished minute, but my laughter met only stricken silence.  A gaping, open silence, complimented with Hermann turning his head around abruptly and shooting me a wavering glare. Good job, Geiszler, you made them look at you like a museum piece. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> "Weil er ein Arschloch ist" -> Because he's an asshole (I couldn't live with not mixing in a few German phrases)  
> Herr Guth (Mr.) -> because I couldn't get used to form of adress
> 
> The last two years of high school the education's separated into ability courses and basic courses. You have 13 subjects in total. Two of them are ability courses (5x40 min per week each) - one of them has to be math or german, the other one can be chosen (History, Physics, Chemistry, English or a second language [here: Latin, French, Russian]). Well, at least that's how it works in Saxony, it varies in the other states. The basic courses are all other subjects, so to speak the subjects you didn't chose as ability course and, for example, arts, P.E., social sciences, biology, philosophy and so on. It's confusing even for the students themselves (I can tell)
> 
> Also, it's very hard to get straight A's, because you have to do every subject and you get grades in everything. So if you're terrible in Sports, you can be brilliant in other subjects and you still won't have a 1.0 (1.0 is the best, grade go from 1-6 or 0-15, but I won't explain that. It's not even interesting)
> 
> For the bit were Newt says he's gay: If you do that in a tiny school in a tiny village, you are going to be marked down as a weird one. I know that. It happened.


	3. Unrockbar.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Crappy food and a shouting match.

„Well, this sure is awkward“, I said, still looking around. “Why’d you say that out loud?” Pascale asked irritated. “Why is it a problem?” I asked back. “It just is.” she insisted, rolling her eyes. Verena moved her facial expression from creepy to annoyed.

Pascale leaned back, watching our classmates turn around again one by one. “It’s just that we really don’t have any gay people in our class.”

“You say that as if it’s a kind of disease. Or a disability.” I snorted, imagining them disinfect themselves because of what I said. “And I also don’t believe you.” “Well, believe what you like, Newton. It’s not my problem.” “No, of course it’s not. Just saying, though” I winked at her “I think what you mean isn’t that there are no homosexual people in your class.” “Our class.” “Whatever. It’s that they didn’t come out publicly.”

“Which makes them not homosexual to us, so what’s the difference?” “I guess the difference is that denying the possibility makes you homophobes.” “We are no homophobes.” Verena said quietly. “Does she always do that?” I asked Pascale, who looked honestly offended and made me rethink what I said earlier. “What?” “One sentence in half an hour.” “She’s more talkative when no one else is around.”

In the lunch break I sat down in the school cafeteria, mainly because there was nowhere else I knew I could go to. The school was in this pesky small town, with small shops, a few Asian take-outs and two gas stations. The cafeteria’s main characteristic was that it was too small. I felt that all 200 students tried to sit there at once – which was logistically impossible, because there were like 50 seats. They fought for tables and seats and tripped over the stuff of the others trying to sit down at one table with their friends. I started to feel slightly claustrophobic when someone asked “Is that table free?” I looked up and saw the evenly faced Florian, who seemed to be joking a bit, since he should fully well know I knew nobody here. Another guy, who was easily 20 cm taller than me, just dropped his bag and pulled out a card. “Is the cafeteria food acceptable?” I asked, watching the tall guy hurrying off to get some. “Well, I won’t eat it. But my friends say it’s fine.” he wrinkled his nose in disbelief.

“Do you just sit around here in the breaks?”

“Sometimes we ditch class and go to Chemnitz by bus.” another girl said while she dropped herself in a chair next to me. She had short, curly red hair and was wearing an overly large sweater, which smelled like coffee and cigarettes. “At least we did that last year.”

“I didn’t.” Florian said. “That was only you and Anne.” He sounded righteous. Someone wasn’t in for fun, it seemed. We should do that right now, I thought. And perhaps never come back. “So I heard you gloriously made the others uncomfortable in study time?” the coffee girl asked. “How was I supposed to know that?” Sometimes, I’d like to drown myself in a pile of school-cooked, slimy noodles, headfirst, of course. But I doubted the tall guy, who was eating that sort of de-appetizing looking food, would like that. “Most of them are idiots anyway.” she continued. I smiled. Her disdain was almost palpable. I wonder what they’d done to her. Maybe they were calling her names (I was used to that too. I wouldn’t even start to count the times I’ve been called a freak, a weirdo and, probably the most insulting of all because it wasn’t even a real insult, a _Schwuchtel_.) I saw someone enter the cafeteria and thought of something. “What’s up with this Hermann guy?”

“Why? Did you talk to him?”

“No. I just heard him argue with a teacher.” Before I made a show of myself.

Florian nodded. “Yes, he always does that. What was it about this time?”

“No idea.”

“Well, he moved here last year from Bavaria. We tried to be friends with him, but the others kept making fun of his dialect so he might have thought we wanted to make fun of him too.”

“What dialect? I didn’t hear anything.”

She smiled. “He tries really hard now to not let anyone hear. Only when he’s really angry he –“

“Could you stop doing that, Jasmin?” We heard an angry voice behind us. The tall guy, Florian, the redhead and I turned around and the smiles of at least 2 of us froze. “Do what?” the girl asked.

“Talk about me while I’m sitting right next to you. It keeps happening.” He had a dark, gloomy voice and grimaced in a way that made me think of that one time I tried Vodka Tonic. “HI” I said, ignoring his repulsive facial expression “I am”

“The new guy, I know.” he ended my sentence sourly. “Well, aren’t you moody?” I asked, still smiling. If I wanted to get to know him, there was virtually nothing that would keep me from it. I was very resistant in things like this. “He’s not moody” the redhead, Jasmin, said “If he was moody, he’d have to change moods. But he’s just generally pissed. All the time.”

“I wonder why.” I said sarcastically, starting to feel the tension between the small girl and the tall, spindly guy. Hey, if someone was that openly judging me, I’d be pissed too.

Hermann looked at me with a bit of surprise then he turned around again, facing his meal that consisted of a mean smelling lasagna and yoghurt with cornflakes in it. I, determined not to be ignored, pulled my chair away from the somewhat astonished Jasmin, Florian and Tall Guy and set the chair right on the opposite side of Hermann’s table, who reacted only through an annoyed deep breath. “What’s the matter with you? Go sit with the other unnerving people.” He waved towards the three people, but I got the idea he meant each and every soul sitting in the cafeteria right now. “I’m not a dog”

Aggravated, he shoved his fork into the lasagna. “But you do act like one.” I put my hands on the table, determined not to be shunned, and started listening to music from one headphone. Hermann, who seemed pissed before, narrowed his eyes. “Do you want to sit here?” he asked plainly. I nodded, half to confirm, half to follow the beat. “Then put that crap out!” he commanded. Uh, he was all bossy. I wouldn’t tell him how much I liked that, though. That would probably send me to the bottom of the “hate-forever” list. Or else.

 “That’s not crap!” I argued instead “That’s classic German punk-rock!” “Yeah, in other words, crap.” he commented. While I was fine with being mocked myself, I certainly wasn’t okay with him insulting my taste in music. “Have you even listened to that?” “I can hear enough of it to say that it’s ‘Die Ärzte’. And I dislike them.” “How on earth can you dislike that?” I asked, now louder.

“I’m just not into a couple of troublemakers shouting ‘police state’ just because they dislike the coalition!” “But that’s not what it’s about! Not always!” “But often enough for me to dislike it. _Gottverdammt, warum streitest du dich denn über solchen Scheiß! Du kennst mich doch nicht mal! Hast du denn keine Selbstachtung?_ “

Now we were yelling. It was a bit selfish of me, but I did enjoy yelling at someone, even if it was the Bavarian guy I only met today. The people around me were always so apathetic that meeting someone with passion, even if it was just for the sake of arguing itself, was awesome. I often felt cast out, because I strongly felt about everything I did, no matter if it was watching TV (Yes, I did love King Kong. Why wouldn’t I?) or playing Pokémon (that isn’t just for little children, I’ll continue loving it forever) or even building up an IKEA shelve. 

There was a certain amount of emotion needed to get me to do something; otherwise it would just be plain boring, like the students around me: All they did was lazy. They had lazy interest in the argument Hermann and I had, they didn’t even passionately hate school. Their emotions were a bit… undercooked; something that someone tried to warm up in a broken microwave. And I couldn’t commit myself to suppressing my emotions like this: I’d rather be considered weird for openly shouting at Hermann because he didn’t like “Die Ärzte”. And if Hermann was aggressive enough to yell back, that made it twice as good. He was the most interesting person I met all day, even if he kept yelling I should stop being such a _Saupreiß, damischer_. I didn’t dare asking what that even meant.

While the cafeteria cleared out, I smiled at him. “We should listen to some music together sometime.” He whipped me with his glare, his head colored red. “ _Nur über meine Leiche!”_ he said, before he walked out, leaving me all alone at the smelly table. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Translations for the German bits:  
> Schwuchtel - fag  
> Gottverdammt, warum streitest du dich denn über solchen Scheiß! Du kennst mich doch nicht mal! Hast du denn keine Selbstachtung? - Goddammit, why do you argue about this shit! You don't even know me? Do you have no self-respect?  
> Saupreiß, damischer - that's a Bavarian cuss word and like Newton, I have no idea what the concrete translation is something along the lines of 'Stupid foreigner' or so)  
> Nur über meine Leiche - over my dead body


	4. Der Punk in mir versteckt hinter Nadelstreifen

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> They talk!

As it turned out, Hermann was out of luck when it came to avoiding me. The next morning, after the semi-horrible bus trip, I went to the room where I had Ethics (my dad wasn’t into bringing me up religiously) and the room was full. Well, full up to the place where Hermann sat, all by himself. I dropped into the empty seat next to him – after all, he couldn’t refuse me if there was no other place left – and greeted him.

“Didn’t I tell you to stay away?” he said, putting his sour face on again. After a while, maybe I would get used to it. “You didn’t say that directly” I answered brightly. “But I didn’t think you were in this course?”

While he put out his folder and pens, he said “And why is that?”

“Because you’re Bavarian, I expected you to be Catholic and therefore, having the R.E. course.” He rolled his eyes enough to make it seem hurtful. “Don’t you think that’s racist?” “Why would it be racist? Religion’s not a race.”

“But assuming something is discriminating. It’s a cliché” he added “And my family’s Jewish.”

“I’ve never met a Jewish Bavarian.” I said. I always thought that to be quite the oxymoron, but hey, what did I know. “Right, because you seem to know so many Bavarian people, _Trottel.”_

He turned away to signal me that our conversation was over. Nice talk. The ethic lesson was, if anything, weird. The teacher was a bit muddle-headed and he insisted on showing us photographs he’d taken while he was in India. Not that I cared, but the girls shrieked a bit when he showed sacrificed goats with severed heads and he made the students inadvertently laugh because he told them that he had pot in his backpack. He also assigned presentations, but I observed the other’s not noting down their assigned task, I gathered he was going to forget who’s going to do what by the next lesson anyway.

Still having no idea what my next lesson was, I just walked out behind Hermann, who was the second to be out of the room (the first one was a kid who was always fastest, because he smoked a cigarette behind the school building every break). “Are you following me?” he asked without turning around as we walked down the three stories. “No. That’s totally coincidental. There’s only one staircase, after all” I answered dryly. “Will you keep bugging me until eventually I’ll punch you in the face?” I don't think he could actually punch anyone. “Will you ever attempt to just have a normal conversation?” I countered, holding open the door for him so he could storm out unhindered. Turning my head, I tried to catch a look on his face, but he just turned away, almost tripping over me because he looked in the other direction.

Finally, he stopped, sitting down on a bench (the only one in the sunny schoolyard being unoccupied) and pulling out his breakfast. I just sat down beside him, breathing heavily because of the last 200m sprint. He munched on a burned toast while I searched my backpack for something edible. My dad must’ve packed a banana, because I didn’t remember touching any food that morning. The only sound was our silent chewing – that was, until Hermann sighed.

“I just don’t like people” he said in a tone suggesting he admitted something under stress.

“I gathered that.”

“Why don’t you go and talk to someone who actually wants to talk to you? Try Florian or Tobias, they’re alright.” The alright sounded like high praise from his mouth. “Who’s Tobias?”

“He’s the red haired guy with the glasses and the plaid shirts. Also, he’s head of the students’ council.” There was no red haired guy in my classes, but I just nodded.

“Pff. I rather stay and unnerve you. I’m good at that.”

“I gathered that” he said, mocking my voice a bit too high pitched. My voice wasn’t that screechy and obnoxious, not really. Or was it, now?

“Plus you’re the only one I really talked too yet.” “We didn’t talk, we argued.” “That’s one kind of talk. And, if I might say, it’s one I greatly enjoy.”

At least he had the decency not to roll his eyes three times in a row. “I figured that as well.”

“So, can we now start to talk normally?” I didn’t exactly wait for his answer. “You can start with the _Mean Girls_ routine.”

The look on his face was priceless. “What is _Mean Girls_ and why do I have the slight notion it’s pink?”   

“Okay, I’ll make it easier for you” _since you don’t have any noticeable knowledge about pop-culture_ “Introduce the class to me. They’re just 25 people. It’s easy.” Hermann looked like someone who observed rather than participate, so I thought he was able to deliver on that.

He didn’t look so thrilled. In fact, he looked pissed, fisting his hand until I felt sorry for the bushes of brown hair he’d torn out. “Why would I do that? I just told you I’m not good with people.” Looking into his earnestly disturbed face, I got that he wanted to be left alone. But I couldn’t understand why. “Is it that you’re not good with people, or that people from the start are not good with you?”

“What does it matter?” he asked frustrated. “Can’t I eat in peace?”

“Do you always ask questions?”

“Normally, I don’t talk at all.” I raised my brows at his hesitant tone “But since you’re not leaving me be, I might as well do what you said.”

I put my elbows on my knees, looking at him expectantly until his face softened a bit. “Listen, Idiot” he pointed towards a large group sitting on a Ping-Pong table. “That’s the normal people. At least, what they consider normal: They’re out partying on the weekends, not doing homework on the weekdays and just being mediocre. Also, they have all the attractive people.” They were the largest group, maybe around 15 of them.

“There are a few guys nobody wants to hang around with: The other Tobias, Steven… They call them nerds, but they’re not that much into stuff. It’s more that the normal people lack a better term. If I talked to them, I guess I would be shoved into their drawer.”

“The guys you sat with yesterday – those are the people who aren’t in a group or so and who seem to care enough to be good in school. They think they’re too smart to party with the others and I have no idea what they actually spend their free time with.”

Although Hermann’s voice was neutral, you could hear the slightest bit of disdain for all of them. “But you are smart, too.” I said, because if he wasn’t smart he couldn’t have compensated his weird, not really fitting clothes and his social phobia. So he was smart and alone - sad, but it happens. I was alone too, even though I had people to talk to. 

“Yes, of course I am. But not smart enough to figure out how to ignore you.” I widened my eyes. “Was that a… joke?” I laughed a bit and he actually lifted the corners of his mouth. Not far enough to call it a smile, but it was a start.

The bell rang. “Come on! Let’s go to the German lesson.” He grabbed his bag and didn’t wait for me. Maybe I should’ve actually started talking to the other students. While Hermann was cute (in his own, very uncommon way) it would take baby steps talking normally to him, so I should have some contacts more easily manageable too.

So I sat down next to a person I didn’t know in German, a really good looking guy (who also seemed pretty conscious of his handsomeness) who chatted with me – amiably, but also empty. And he smelled like he used a whole can of AXE deodorant and hairspray to get his blond hair so firm.

The English teacher was a nice woman who desperately tried to get us to talk in English with her and who became more and more disheartened because of our (lack of) abilities.

In English, Hermann sat next to me. He looked bored to death; even though I was sure he could talk English just fine. “Are you that unenthusiastic in every lesson?” I whispered.

“Just in the ones I personally find useless.” He snapped. My gaze wandered to the teacher, showing some caricature we should interpret. She would most likely be really offended by him saying that. Every teacher seemed to think his or her subject was the most important one – each and every one would deny the uselessness of any subject, though.

“What do you think is useless, then?”

“German, Philosophy, English, Ethics.” “Not Arts?”

“I’m actually in Music class.”

“Oh, alright. Me, too”

“That I don’t find useless. But I like working with numbers. Numbers hardly backfire, unlike discussions and essays, they’re not opinionated.”  He did have a point. I liked working with numbers, facts, too. They were easier to focus on. I tended to get a bit loud and disturbing in subjects where argumentation was needed, so I was easier to work with (at least in theory) in scientific subjects.

I grinned at Hermann, who kept looking disgruntled. “So, if you’re in music, does that mean you can actually sing?”

He didn’t answer. Well, I’d find that out soon enough.

At the end of the lesson – that is, the teacher ended it 15 minutes early, being displeased with our general unattentiveness – she told us that there would be a long term project. “Our main topic this semester is media, so I want you to prepare a presentation, 20 minutes long, about how the new types of media influence our lives. That might be a normal speech, or a video. Every one of you has a partner, so I hope there won’t be any problems. If there is a problem, ask anytime. See you next Tuesday or, if you’re in Latin, on Thursday.”

I looked around – she was right, everyone had a partner because every table occupied by two students – which left me with… Hermann. He must’ve realized about the same second I did, because he glared murderously at the back of the leaving teacher, then at me.  
“Great” he muttered “I hate partner tasks.” Looking me directly into the eyes, he said “I should warn you, I suck at group work.”

As if I hadn’t already known that. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Another info on the school system (is anybody even interested in that?): As I said, you have 13 subjects. These subjects are spread all over the weeks, so the schedule's different every day. You keep one schedule for a whole year but are graded per semester. Generally, school's from around 7.30 in the morning up until (but not all the time) 15.40 in the evenings. It varies from school to school though.  
> In Saxony, you can choose between Arts and Music. Arts is procrastinating all the time with very vage tasks, music is singing all the time and getting graded for singing.  
> You can also choose between Ethics and Religious Education (which is mostly protestant and taught by a priest in year 11 and 12).   
> Also, German teachers are big on asking opinion questions, so what we do most of the time in tests is writing gibberish. 
> 
> I always found it weird that Hermann was Bavarian and of Jewish descent (because Bavaria is known for Catholicism). 
> 
> Trottel = idiot
> 
> A students council is a very serious thing where you can argue about the most ridiculous things.


	5. Egal woran es liegt, es liegt nicht an mir

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> There's school routine and there's Hermann and Newt starting to get along, well, sort of.

The next morning Hermann was not in my class. I mentally chided myself for looking out for him. He shouldn’t be concerning me. Well, not much.

That was at least what I said to myself on Wednesday. But of course it happened otherwise – I never was strong with upholding a certain behavior:

On Thursday, I sat next to Hermann in Biology, who wasn’t as interested into genetics as I was, apparently, and who insisted on using two books even though the teacher said we should work together. We were in the same foreign language course, but he wasn’t eager on practicing a French dialogue about our holidays either – he seemed to ignore French the same way he did with English. He looked more content in Math, but also bored. But maybe that was his general facial expression, how would I know? I drew little three dimensional cubes in my coordinate system while we should calculate integrals, which brought me a displeased frown from him.

On Friday, he said all of the books we were assigned for German by the teacher were shit while glaring at the teacher. In the free period, I sat down on his table and watched him eat, but he refused to talk to me. “Man, what have I done to you that you ignore me?” I asked, frustrated, after he ignored me every break.   
“Why do you have to keep unnerving me, Newton? Does it give you some immature pleasure to see me annoyed by you? I suppose it’s funny.” He sounded so fed up I just watched him for a second while he split a dry-looking potato in half. “I don’t try to make fun of you.” I said. For him to assume that he must’ve made really bad experiences in school.

“I just try to be nice.”

“Well, you can stop. I don’t need anyone to pity me.”

“Ugh, Hermann, I don’t pity you. I seriously want to get to know you.” I didn’t add that I found him kinda cute, which would’ve made him so mad that even I could predict it. Besides, that would make him think I really wanted to make fun of him, because he certainly wasn’t the ideal of what other people would call cute.

“What’s the point?” he asked. Man, either Hermann was depressed or he should seriously get a bit less tense. “We both don’t have much of a social life. I never had that much social contact, but here it’s like I’m not existent.”

“It’s because you’re new.” Hermann said, as if I didn’t know that. It seemed to be a habit of his. “And I’m new, too.”   
“But you’ve been here for a year.”   
“Yes and I’ve been new for a year.”   
“Why are you in the twelfth grade, anyway?”

“Because I changed states, they suggested I should repeat the eleventh grade.” he sounded pissed at that. I just found it strange, because I didn’t have to. Or maybe my dad talked them out of it. And I was thankful for that – another year of school was not what I wanted. What I wanted was to go back to Berlin in no time.

“So, you want to get to know me?” he asked, still sounding disbelieving.   
“Yes!” I said firmly.

And then he left. Great.

And it was like that the next three weeks. All I got to hear were his complains about the subjects he hated or his frowns about my behavior in the subjects he liked. We even argued, because he had to sing in Music. “I knew you could sing, dude” I said, smiling, because he sounded awesome. Like, actually talented awesome. “So what?” he snapped, his face starting to burn. “Well, that’s cool. You’re good.”   
Which was fine, although he was still blushing, until some of the more uncivilized classmates shouted “Uuh, Hermann, you’ve got yourself a boyfriend!” I've been getting shit about me being gay from day one on, so I started to get used to it. It wasn't like my old classmates had been completely accepting. Hermann, however, couldn't work around people saying something like that, no matter how retarded they were.  
“What, no!” he shouted back, completely horrified. “Stop that, you ass-faced homophobes!” I yelled to generally all of them, because they either laughed or looked away. “Leave him alone!”   
“Oh, do you need him to protect you - How cuuute!” the guy hollered, so I got up, ready to punch him.

The teacher just stood there, stone faced. “Get out of my classroom. Now! All three of you.” He pointed to the ass, Hermann and me. “And, Hermann? That was an A”

Hermann, still red faced, ran out of the room. “Can you just leave me alone?” he yelled when I followed him “You’re making it worse.”

“And what do you do? Just let them make fun of you?” I yelled, because his complete restraint took me aback. “Works for me.” he said plainly and walked away. I tried following him, but he just said I should leave him alone.

“How was school?” my dad asked me when I came home. “Oh, super. I got thrown out of a classroom” I threw my backpack into a corner and sat down at the kitchen table to pour me a cup of coffee. My dad frowned. “Do I need to worry about you? You seem a bit down lately. And normally, you don’t get into trouble.”

“Well, blame it on those hillbillies.” I grunted “They’re assholes and homophobes and generally even worse than the people in Berlin which I, personally, didn’t even think possible. Until now.”

My dad rested his head on his hands, looking at me closely “Do you ever think about how they’re not even worth your rage?” “Maybe not if they were going after me. Then I would just mock them. But they harass my… friend.” I was lacking a better term. What was I supposed to say? My 'Hermann'?  
“So you want to punch them?”  
“Exactly.”  
“Then stop it.” He looked at me sternly. “I don’t think your friend would like that anyway.” He could talk. He didn't even know Hermann. 

I snorted. “No, of course not. He doesn’t like anything or anyone. And I’m not even sure we’re friends. Most of the time he just looks at me disdainful.” My dad got up, squeezed my shoulder and let me be. He wasn’t much of a talker, especially not about feelings, but I was grateful that he didn’t have a problem with me being gay. That made it easier to feel fine at least at home. Not that I actively hated school – most of the time it was just boring, but I could live through it for another 8 months. That wasn’t a problem.

 After the scene in music, it took me a while to start talking to him again. Not because I didn’t want to, but because he sent me a murderous glare every time I tried it. So, I just talked to Anne and Florian, who were nice, sure, but not nearly as interesting as Hermann, because they weren’t annoyed by me. They just accepted me and acted on it. But I liked a bit of a challenge and Hermann was that challenge, so, Tuesday in the fifth week I caught him before our English class.

“Hey, Hermann. Do you want to do something with me?” He turned around. We were standing in the first floor, right between the doors of the boys and girls room and the hallway was gloomy as ever, because there were no windows in between and the lights were usually smashed. It smelled like coffee from the science teacher’s lounge. This was the building I liked less – it had tighter staircases, so I always felt a bit claustrophobic.

“If I say yes, will you stop staring at me as if I was an experiment in the lessons?” I hadn’t notice that I was looking often enough at him for him to notice. “Yes, I think. Let’s go now.” I said, buzzed from his agreement.   
“But we have English.” he said, obviously confused. I moved a step closer to him. “Oh, Hermann, have you never ditched a class?”  
“I always thought that something only those teenagers in the American movies do.”

“Well, but we’re going to do it now. We can go to Chemnitz.” Anne told me he lived in Chemnitz with his father, who was a doctor of some sorts, and two of his siblings. Hermann looked hesitant. “Normally, I follow the rules. I don’t necessarily like them, but I follow them.” He put on his teacher voice, which made me smile a bit “I like my world to have an order.”

“The world won’t lose its order if you ditch a class once in a while.” I teased him. It’s not as if civilization was built on attendance rates.  “A bit of fun doesn’t erase your abilities. You might want to loosen up a bit.”   
“What, like you?” he asked sarcastically. “No, thanks. I’d rather be called stuck up than being as hapless as you.” I wasn’t hapless. And, well, if you wanted to be stuck up, there you go. Mission accomplished, I thought, shoving my hands into my jeans pockets.

“But we’ll try it your way for once” he said, walking out of the hallway. Blinking confused for a second, and then realizing he was actually doing this, I followed him to the bus stop. He tried grinning, I realized, but it looked a bit untrained. He definitely did enjoy my surprised face, though, that ass.

“I wanted to apologize for last week” Hermann said as he was sitting next to me in the empty bus. He sounded as if he was having about as much fun I have when I’m getting a cavity filled. “Huh. No problem.” I said. I didn’t expect him to say anything concerning that. “And what do we do now?” he asked.

“We could go to your place. You do live here, right?” he nodded. No, it wasn’t just because I wanted to see his probably impeccably clean room.   
“And what would we do there? What is it you wanted to do that’s worth missing English?”

“Come on, you hate English” I laughed at his sour face. “We could watch a movie. Do you have King Kong?”  
“I don’t have any DVDs. Especially not monster movies.”   
“What, you don’t like them?” He must be joking, I prayed inside my head, please, let him be joking.   
“I think it’s ridiculous and most of the time so badly animated that I can’t bear looking at it.” Not joking, then. Fantastic. So we had basically nothing in common at all. That certainly made spending an afternoon together a bit hard. 

“How can you not like monster movies?”

“I did just tell you why.” he said, eyes rolling again.   
“But that wasn’t an emotional answer!”   
“Why would I answer a question like this emotionally?” he said, wrinkling his nose as if to say ‘Ugh, emotion’ “I’m not you.”

“But the bad animations are half the fun!” I said emphatically.   
“Is this the reboot of the argument about your taste in music? If so, then I’m not interested. You do realize we’re standing at the central station. I don’t really want to start a fight right now.”

He was right – we were standing on the boardwalk of the main road which led to the inner city, apparently. “I’ve never been to Chemnitz before.”  
“Well, it’s not like you’re missing anything. Even the people in Chemnitz hate Chemnitz.”   
“You do, of course.”  
“This time, I think, the _Chemnitzer_ from our school share my opinion.”

Chemnitz wasn’t pretty, I got that. It was all Eastern Bloc chic, prefabricated slab-construction buildings, left-over socialist statues and a neat, but small, inner city which looked acceptable. But Berlin was a bit like that, too. They just seemed to care more about how it looked after the Fall of the Wall, since it was the capital.

“Where did you live before you moved here?” I asked; taking in the pedestrian zone we were aimlessly walking through. “Garmisch-Partenkirchen.” “I have absolutely no idea about that city.” “It doesn’t matter. But I do know Berlin. I was there on a class trip, eighth grade.”

“And, what did you do? Visit the Bundestag?” “Yes. And Madam Tussauds.” Right. I nodded, unsure how to comment on that.   
“How was your old school?” I asked, before there could be an embarrassing silence.

“Different, but not better. Math was more difficult, though” I couldn’t read his voice, but I was sure he meant that as a positive thing. “You have a thing for math, eh?” He sighed. “You could say that.”

In the end, we did go to his home, which was not in the inner city. He was living in a renovated old building which had to be at least 150 years old. “There’s no one home?” I asked, staring up the high wooden door. “Don’t be ridiculous.” Hermann huffed “It’s the middle of the day. Perhaps my mom – she’ll drop dead of surprise that I actually have a… friend.” He seemed to try out the word, tried to feel if it was okay in his mouth. “Was that sarcasm, Hermann?” I laughed.

We walked up the stairs. His house was beautiful and I whistled through my teeth. “What is it?” “It’s pretty cool, that’s all.” I said. It wasn’t as sterile as I had expected. There was soft radio music coming from one door. Hermann opened it. “Hello, _Mama._ ” “You’re home early, Hermann. Even before your sister.” I awkwardly stepped into the kitchen, where the frankly horrible radio music came from, and shook his mother’s hand. “Hello, Mrs. Gottlieb. I’m Newton.” Her big blue eyes widened a bit as she looked from Hermann back to me. “Oh, please, call me Fanny.” She looked very different from Hermann – her figure was much more natural and she had wavy blonde hair that was in a ponytail. I looked about as much like my mother as Hermann didn’t look like his.

“Do you want some food?” she asked now. “Oh, no, we’ve eaten in school.” Hermann answered. Well, he did. I watched him, as I always did. Maybe I should try suggesting we eat the Chinese take-out food the others got in the town someday, so I actually wouldn’t starve.

“Your mom seems nice” I said as we walked to his room, where I sat down on a sofa. His room was bigger than mine, but a bit more impersonal – it lacked posters, photographs, anything that would make Hermann’s character shine through. “Mom’s tend to be nice, I assume” Hermann said, sitting down on the edge of his neatly done bed (mine was always unmade – why smooth out my comforter if I sleep in it the next night, anyway). “Oh, I don’t know. I saw mine about three or four times in total and she didn’t seem to care much.”

Did I sound bitter? Hermann looked as if he couldn’t decide between pitying me and ignoring me. “Why?” he asked, then. “She basically abandoned me as a child.” This wasn’t something I usually told the people. They tended to assume that I was so obnoxious because I never had a real mom. But my dad really was alright. He was, in fact, great.

“Okay.” Hermann said. I supposed he wasn’t used to people telling him something emotional. Or even talking about emotion in general, which was, I guessed, the reason he put on the TV. “I don’t believe that I’m actually saying this but … Do you want to watch Godzilla?”   
“I thought you don’t like monster movies?” I asked, trying to hide my bliss. I loved Godzilla. “My dad and my brother have a thing for it.” 

I didn’t ask him what made him change his mind, but Hermann being nice to me was rare enough. So we actually spent the evening watching Godzilla. He endured it with grace – he only rolled his eyes, like, five times. After the movie, I stood up, stretching. I hadn’t realized, but we did lie pretty close on Hermann’s bed, which was not necessary since it was a double bed. Hermann pulled himself up and shut the television of. “Well, this was a bit better than English.” he said. “Thanks for the high praise, dude” I said laughing.

“No, seriously. Hanging out with you is not as … deplorable as I thought it would be.” “Cool, I guess.” I said, raising a brow.

To say that made us both easier to be around each other would be an understatement – we did spend a lot of time together, since none of us had anything better to do, it seemed. We watched my ‘horrible movies’ as Hermann put it, did homework on my bedroom floor (‘You do realize this room is about the size of a shoebox?’ he asked me once, because if he sat on the ground, his scrawny legs were half the length of my room. ‘You should’ve seen the one in Berlin.’ I just grinned) and listened to music, to which Hermann reacted with “Do you really have to torture me, now that we actually get along?” We didn’t get along all the time, though – We argued about our different opinions on the sense of Math versus Biology, which resulted in him almost knocking me out with his _Abiturwissen Geschichte_ book. We argued about the school food vs. the take-out food. We argued about who was driving the car (it was Hermann’s car, sure, but I could’ve driven it too – I was seventeen, after all). Arguing was as much our routine as other people’s routine was partying on Sundays. And, if Hermann liked it or not, I enjoyed it way too much to just let his sometimes exaggerated arrogance win.

I also started noticing the really nice things about Hermann – and he was growing more attractive to me. Sadly, he wasn’t much of an outgoing character, so I wouldn’t know how he felt about anything concerning me unless he shouted it right to my face. And that was not going to happen anytime soon.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So, this is a long chapter. I got a bit carried away and I didn't know how to divide it afterwards, so I kept it the way it was.


	6. Wir haben geträumt; es war 'ne lange Nacht

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Alcohol, dancing and a kiss.

“So, what do we do this evening?” We made, unintentionally, a habit of meeting on days when all the others had something to do. This evening, though, was the 31st of October and even though most of the people I knew in Saxony wouldn’t celebrate Halloween, my new class decided to have a party to get money for their last class trip. Talking Hermann into going to the party, though, was a hard piece of work.

„Aww, come on, when was the last time you had fun?“

“In this school, with those people? Never.”

“Well, great. Then we’re going to have fun.” I sure noticed Hermann’s alarmed face, but I wasn’t bothered by it. “Did you take the car today, Hermann?"   
“Yes. Why?” “As I said: Operation ‘Hermann needs to have some fun’.”

“I have plenty of fun. Alone, at home. When you’re not busy bugging me.” I fluttered my eyelashes at him and painted my best puppy expression all over my face. “Ah, but that’s not bugging. That’s helping you.”

“Helping me with what? Driving me into Hara-kiri?” “Well, first things first” I said, smirking, because his banter surely meant he was giving in “Now we’re going to the disco.”

His terrified glare followed me all the way to his car, which was a tiny, blue Honda with bad radio reception. The second he opened the car, I hoped onto the driver’s seat. “Tonight I’m the designated driver! Don’t worry; I can drink water as if it was wine.” I had a high tolerance, due to my Berlin experiences. There, at least, I could walk home. 

That seemed to make him frown even more, but, strangely enough, he complied by opening the passenger door and quietly sat down. “Can you promise me it’s really going to be fun?” he sighed. “I’ll try my best.” “Yeah, I was afraid of that.”

The disco was just a small building, but I felt as if all the surrounding villages had expelled the teenagers that lived there, so they searched for refuge in the club – in other words, it was a raging mess. Meeting the people from our class who were sitting on the cash desk was a bit weird and they shot us funny looks, but they didn’t try to take our money. “Great!” I said, soaking in the atmosphere of shitty, electronic music and Hermann actually wearing a T-Shirt. It was one of mine, granted, but I could talk him into it. He looked less serious in it, more like his actual age. I wasn’t entirely sure what I loved more: His skinny body in a plain black shirt, tight fitting through his body (he looked a bit like a mirror in a haunted mansion, stretched into the height) or his shirt and sweater attire from the school days. It was cute, seeing him eyeing the floor while yelling at me it will be my fault if he was deaf until his mid-twenties.

“Were you never inside a club?” I asked with a raised brow. He shook his head in a manner that made my question look absurd. “So I guess you’re not into dancing?” I suppressed a smile when he let himself fall into a corner booth. Looking around the discotheque, it was not as crappy as I thought it would be. The seating areas were dimly lit, most of the neon lights exchanged for ultraviolet fluorescent tubes which made the seams of my chucks glow. There was a dance floor, now empty, and flashy beams. There were four bars including one were you could smoke hookah, which I never tried. Hermann sat in the corner, hands folded in his laps and I started to panic. I promised him fun, so I should be able to deliver. Going back on my word wasn’t something I wanted to be known for, even if it was a small thing like that. Because I could hardly change the music, I tried the next best thing: “Let me get you a drink.”

Anne told me that they didn’t card anyone for the drinks and it wasn’t matter what you ordered when you older than 16. I tried my luck by ordering shots (Tequila and Stroh 80, which was both deadly and shouldn’t be combined) and succeeded. Hermann looked from the drinks to my face: “Do you want to poison me?” he asked, concerned, while sniffing the glass. “No, but we’ll only start enjoying the music when we’re a bit drunk. How good do you hold a drink?”

“Well enough.” he said, but he didn’t convince me. Hermann looked as if his last drink was on his Jugendweihe and even that had been just a cultured glass of wine. This was a whole different thing, but I kept my concerns to myself. Instead I put the drink in his hand, hooked my arm into his and said “On three!” Then we downed the drinks. Well, I downed it; he seemed to choke on it. After this, things became a little blurry. I ordered more drinks; after a while, I thought it would seem fit to dance. Hermann, which took me by surprise, had no arguments against that whatsoever, so I pulled him towards the now packed dance floor and started to move. The dance floor was black tiled and sticky, as if more than a few dropped their beer glasses onto it. It felt as if I was moving in slow motion and my converse made a plopping sound every time I moved my feet. At first, Hermann noticed that all with disgust in his eyes, but once he started to let loose a bit, he seemed to even enjoy himself – at least he was smiling brightly, but I wasn’t sure if that was really him or the Vodka-Ahoy expressing himself.

Hermann looked woozy, but that made me more relaxed in his environment. This time, he wouldn’t act superior. And there wasn’t a chance he’d start a fight, judging by the way he tugged at my shirt while we danced, more with each other than in general. “I do have fun, Newton, _hoast mi?”_ I bit my lip while not trying to laugh at his dialect. Maybe he couldn’t contain it while he was being drunk. _“D’Welt isch veruggt. I dachte ned, dass mia uns ofreindn würdn_.“ „Me neither, Hermann. But I did hope.“

„ _Des is ja richt’g süß vo dia_!“ He did call me sweet now, did he? Okay, time to get him off the dance floor. “Do you want to get outside for a bit, Hermann?”

_“Bisd du narrisch? Ich wui tanzn!”_ I decided he was a bit weak-willed now and I would be able to get him out anyway. When we were standing outside, in the cold October night, I thought about what he said earlier. Didn’t the others mention that drunken guys always tell the truth?

I bit my lip, unsure what to do. Maybe I could ask him, if he felt something. I mean, what harm could that do? Considering his state, he was going to forget everything he told me now anyway. I cleared my throat, sitting down on a bench next to him. I was freezing in my skimpy t-shirt, but Hermann didn’t seem to be bothered by the cold. Starting to feel the results of the alcohol myself, I wanted to drop myself on top of Hermann and roll around with him, right there, on the pavement in front of the club. I wanted to grab him and kiss him until he gave in to that tension that was there. But, since there was still a tiny bit of common sense in me, I decided that wouldn’t be the best move.

“Hermann?” I asked, quietly. He looked at me, his brown eyes washed clear from disdain and disgust, and I continued talking. “Do you really think I’m sweet?” He blinked irritated, as if he didn’t know what he said earlier. I sighed.

_“Find I schoan.”_ he admitted after a while. I stared at him for a moment. _“Oh, Hermann, verdammt!”_ I cursed, grabbing him now after all, right by the collar of his shirt. When I pulled him towards me, he clenched his fist behind my neck, acting far more responsive than I thought he would’ve. But then again, I never thought that possible after all. Hermann, who moaned even though I did nothing more but slightly grasp his hair (it really was as soft as I thought) and who tasted like gasoline, mumbled something unintelligible into my mouth, but I took it as an advice to get right at it. I bit his lip, gleefully noticing he leaned in further after that, when he suddenly pulled away. “What is it?” I asked, worried, because he had a strange impression on his face.

And then there was a Deja vu. I felt as though a million teen movies tried to scream and warn me about what would happen next, but I still was too dazed from the kiss to see “Ten Things I hate about You” frantically waving. To be short, he puked onto my shoes. Not just right past them or putting a few droplets with the stench of liquor on them, but really hitting them. “Oh, Hermann” I sighed, to fed up to actually shriek in disgust about my ruined sneakers. “You said you could keep down your alcohol.” _“I hob gschwindelt”_ he said miserable, wiping his mouth with my T-Shirt (Ew!). “I know, I know” I said, helplessly patting his back while thinking about how ironic the puke directly after the kiss was.

I wanted to bring him home, but I saw clearly that driving his car was not going to happen tonight. “Can you stay here for a sec?” I asked him. He hung his head down, looking like a brown haired picture of misery. I went in, searching for Anne, who was luckily still standing at the cash desk. “Didn’t you say you live here?” I asked, pulling up one of the corners of my mouth. “Oh no, what happened?” She seemed agitated. I gathered that happened to her before. “Please don’t tell me you need to stay for the night.”

“Well, I technically don’t, but Hermann…”

“Why’d you bring him, anyway?” she asked. “Everyone knows he can’t stomach alcohol.” I wondered when she found that out, but I didn't ask just then. 

“No one told me that!”

“But you have to be out of the living room by half past six in the morning.” she agreed hesitatingly.

“Thank you!” I turned to hug her, but she gently shoved my away, saying “No offense, but you smell like the toilets here. Don’t get that on my costume.” She gave me the key, saying it was the house next door, the first floor and that I would owe her until eternity.

“Wanna go home, Hermann?” I asked, looking at him still sitting on the bench. He nodded, looking very young. And he looked trusting, which felt as if someone had given me a gift I didn’t deserve. “Well, come on then. Anne lets us stay over.” “Anne? Why don’t you drive me home?”

“I don’t think I should drive.” “I can” “Please put that idea back to where it came from, okay, Hermann? Do me that favor.”

I opened the door to Anne’s house, which was a simple yellow building with two stories and a cellar and put on the lamp, very quietly. Compared to the freezing wind outside it was downright toasty and welcoming and I felt the need for a snack. Back in Berlin, the few friends I had and I would get a greasy pizza after partying, but Anne would probably ninja-kick me if I tried to steal food from her parents’ fridge.

Ignoring my growling stomach, I left the shoes in the corridor and searched for the living room, which Anne told me to be the last room straight down the hall. I opened the door, which screeched a bit, and urged Hermann to lie down on the couch. “Are you going to join me?” he asked, eyes wide open. I observed him, pulling the blanket out that lay underneath him, expectantly scooting a bit back so maybe; just maybe, another body would fit unto the sofa.

“Well, it’s going to be uncomfortable.” I tried.

“Doesn’t matter. _Ich will kuscheln_.” he said, so very uncharateristically for Hermann, lifting the blanket. _“Oh, Mist.”_ I cussed; sliding under the blanket with him, knowing it would not end well the next morning. He put his bony arms around me, which was, in terms of comfort, not the greatest thing ever, but the most intimate thing I’d done with anyone since half a year, maybe longer, ago.  

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The alcohol - in Germany, the legal drinking age is 16 (beer, wine) or 18 (everything else) but most of the times no one's interested in your age. 
> 
> Vodka-Ahoy -> Vodka, but before you drink the shot you have to lick sherbet powder off your wrist 
> 
> Bavarian Stuff:  
> hoast mi - Do you understand me?  
> D’Welt isch veruggt. I dachte ned, dass mia uns ofreindn würdn.“ - The world's crazy. I'd never thought that we'd be friends.  
> „Des is ja richt’g süß vo dia!“ - That's awfully sweet of you!  
> “Bisd du narrisch? Ich wui tanzn!” - Are you crazy? I wanna dance!  
> Find I schoan - I really think so  
> Oh,..., verdammt - Oh, damn  
> I hob gschwindelt - I lied  
> Ich will kuscheln - I wanna cuddle/snuggle  
> Mist - crap
> 
> The class party really is a thing: You rent a club and a DJ and earn the entrance fees. It's really lucrative and basically well attended. Also, normally we don't have halloween parties (no private ones, anyway).


End file.
